Tag: Ba

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January 2016: The Story so Far, KM and Creativity

[Note: I originally wrote this article for the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Nuclear Knowledge Management wiki, which can be accessed here: https://wiki-nkm.iaea.org/wiki/index.php/The_IAEA_Wiki_on_Nuclear_Knowledge_Management]

Creativity and Knowledge Management

Introduction, definitions, background

Knowledge management and creativity would seem to be two completely different ideas and disciplines, but in fact they can and do enable and enrich each other and in the process of doing that enhance innovation.

Knowledge management is defined as: the process of capturing, developing, sharing, and effectively using organizational knowledge. It refers to a multi-disciplinary approach to achieving organizational objectives by making the best use of knowledge.

Creativity is defined as: the ability to transcend traditional ideas, rules, patterns, relationships, or the like, and to create meaningful new ideas, forms, methods, interpretations, etc.; originality, progressiveness, or imagination: the need for creativity in modern industry; creativity in the performing arts. Another definition says that creativity is the reorganization of experience into new configurations: a function of knowledge, imagination, and evaluation.

Innovation is defined as: a new idea, more effective device or process, it can be viewed as the application of better solutions that meet new requirements, unarticulated needs, or existing market needs. The term innovation can be defined as something original and more effective and, as a consequence, new, that “breaks into” the market or society.

According to “inGenius: A Crash Course on Creativity,” by Tina Seelig, creativity can be learned.

Nonaka discusses the idea of “ba” in his book, “The Knowledge Creating Company,” as well as other published articles; “ba” is the idea of making space for (knowledge) creation. This idea of space is through the use of physical and/or virtual space, and includes the idea of (emergent) relationships and mental/intellectual/emotional space (reflection, and just being).

Connection between creativity and knowledge management

Knowledge management is the set of tools that underlies any knowledge-based activity; everything is knowledge-based. The question is how to facilitate, enhance, and improve efficiency and effectiveness of any process/activity through the use of knowledge management activities.

Improved efficiency and effectiveness comes from finding new, creative, innovative solutions. How do we do this?

Two books can give us insights on solving this problem. The first is in the process of being written, the other was published in 2000. The book that is in the process of being written is by Ger Driesen and is about what we can learn about learning from Vincent Van Gogh; the second was written by Michael J. Gelb and is entitled, “How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day.”

From Van Gogh we learn:

  1. Think inside the box (apply scarcity/constraints)
  2. Practice/study
  3. Reflect
  4. Understand your own story/motivation
  5. When you master a level change the rules
  6. Value solitude, not loneliness
  7. Circumstances: join them or beat them

From Leonard da Vinci we learn:

  1. Curiosity
  2. Independent thinking/diversity
  3. Sharpen your senses (listen/mindfulness, appreciate beauty)
  4. Embrace uncertainty
  5. Balance logic and imagination
  6. Balance body and mind
  7. Make new connections

To do these things we need to have the space, or as Nonaka identified, the Ba for knowledge creation.

Using these activities as well as specific knowledge management activities to aid in innovation helps us to move between the organized knowledge and the unorganized knowledge that exists. The KM activities that aid in innovation are:

  1. Business driven action learning (learn through doing)
  2. Coaching and mentoring
  3. Communities of practice
  4. External assessment and benchmarking
  5. Knowledge capture from projects
  6. Knowledge exchange
  7. Knowledge harvesting from individuals
  8. Lessons learned
  9. Peer assists
  10. Project learning
  11. Organizational Learning, Training

Organized knowledge includes things that have been documented, in books, journals, repositories, libraries, databases, and slide decks, that we know/have access to. Whereas unorganized knowledge is knowledge that hasn’t been discovered yet either because the experiments haven’t been preformed or it resides in the heads of people we haven’t met yet.

What allows us to pass back and forth between organized and unorganized is the use of critical thinking. Critical thinking allows us to question what we know and to ask questions to discover new knowledge, but it also allows us to take the new knowledge and organize it into new or existing models. Critical thinking allows us to apply “the rules” but it also allows us to question and break “the rules” in order to make new discoveries and learn.

Additionally, we can use creativity and innovation to enhance knowledge management; we do this by applying critical thinking to our knowledge management activities. For example, instead of just looking at other similar projects that have been done within our organization or industry and learning from them, we can think critically about other industries that might have had a similar strategic issue and how they solved it. A nuclear power plant may learn how to resolve a training issue from the automotive industry or from an NGO who also struggled with just-in-time training delivery. Alternatively, what results have we discovered in participating in a Community of Practice, in a Peer Assist, or After Action Review how does this impact what we already thought we knew?

Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is the objective analysis and evaluation of an issue in order to form a judgment. It underlies all of knowledge management; it is what pushes us to learn. Asking “why” 5 times will help us get to the root of a problem or understanding our assumptions and asking, “what if that’s not true?” can also help use to see things differently, to look at things from a different perspective. Without the ability to think/reflect on and to question our experiences the whole foundation of knowledge management crumbles.

Critical thinking encourages us to keep an open mind and gather information and evidence before coming to a conclusion.

Creative Pursuits

There are three main types of creative domains:

  1. Art (ah!) as in beauty
  2. Discovery (aha!) as in enlightenment
  3. Humor (haha!) as in joyful pleasure

Art as in beauty ties into one of the items that we can learn from Leonardo da Vinci, about sharpening your senses, which is really about paying attention, listening, and observing the world around you. Art (painting, sculpture, music, literature, and dance) in this case helps to think about and observe, to ask questions about what you are seeing. In the case where you get involved in the creation of art, it magnifies this effect and can have a more significant impact on the outcome.

Making time to be creative in day-to-day life opens up possibilities, it can help you look at things differently.

Graphical Depiction

The figure below illustrates how all of these ideas fit together.

How Creativity and KM fit together. (c) Stephanie Barnes, Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting
How Creativity and KM fit together.
(c) Stephanie Barnes, Missing Puzzle Piece Consulting

Competitive Advantage

With the pace of change today it is imperative to be constantly improving and innovating in order to stay ahead of the competition and in the case of nuclear energy the competition isn’t just other nuclear energy producers, it is alternative energy generation methods. Creativity can help because it aids in looking at the problem/challenge differently and encourages using solutions that may have been developed in other organizations/industries.

References:

  1. HBR To Get More Creative Become Less Productive, https://hbr.org/2015/11/to-get-more-creative-become-less-productive
  2. Concept of Ba, https://www.cyberartsweb.org/cpace/ht/thonglipfei/ba_concept.html
  3. Definition of Knowledge Management, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_management#cite_note-2UNC-2, accessed on Dec 4, 2015 at 4;07pm CET.
  4. Definition of Creativity, https://dictionary.reference.com/browse/creativity, accessed on Dec 4, 2015 at 3:55pm CET.
  5. Definition of Innovation, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation, accessed on Dec 4, 2015 at 4:12pm.
  6. Genius: A Crash Course on Creativity by Tina Seelig, https://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780062020703, accessed December 4, 2015 at 4:25pm.
  7. Vincent van Gogh and Learning, https://www.learningsolutionsmag.com/articles/1560/emea-reporter-vincent-van-goghpainterand-learning-coach
  8. How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci by Michael Gelb, https://michaelgelb.com/programs/how-to-think-like-leonardo-da-vinci/
  9. Critical Thinking on Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_thinking
  10. Developing Critical Thinking Through the Arts, https://www.visionsonlearningdifferences.com/main3.html
  11. Engaged Knowledge Management, https://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/engaged-knowledge-management-kevin-c-desouza/?isb=9781403945105
  12. Blog posts about Creativity and KM, https://missingpuzzlepiececonsulting.ca/category/creativity
  13. Creativity = Competitive Advantage, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/working-creativity/201109/creativity-competitive-advantage-0
  14. Creativity is the Next Competitive Advantage, https://enterprisearchitects.com/creativity-is-the-next-competitive-advantage/
  15. Swarm Creativity: Competitive Advantage through Collaborative Innovation Networks, https://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195304121.001.0001/acprof-9780195304121
  16. Collaborative Innovation Network on Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collaborative_innovation_network
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What we can learn from Van Gogh for KM and Innovation

On November 11, 2015 I participated in a #PKMChat called, “Van Gogh on Learning” https://kneaver.com/blog/2015/11/pkmchat-van-gogh-on-learning/ it intrigued me as both a knowledge management professional and an artist and definitely gave me something to reflect on over the last week.

(Note: the #PKMChat was based on work that Ger Driesen is doing, he facilitated the #PKMChat along with Bruno Winck, more about Ger’s work can be found by clicking on the link in #2 in the references listed below)

I have been investigating the linkages between/among creativity, innovation, and knowledge management for more than three years, picking up ideas along the way, and experimenting and talking to people. Informally, there seems to be an agreement that there is a connection among the three things, but it’s in the background, below the surface, not immediately obvious to a lot of people. The #PKMChat helped shed some light on these linkages for me, so I am sharing them with you.

There are three main ideas that we discussed in the #PKMChat,

  1. Thinking inside the box
  2. Practice
  3. Reflection

As well as some secondary topics, like qualities of an artist, and how to balance social vs. solo learning.

One of the first things I noticed about comments on the #PKMChat was the perception that artists have a different perspective, that they are more inclined to experiment, and that there is a natural curiosity in being creative. Certainly this echoes other articles and books I’ve come across and was one of the reasons for Xerox’s artist in residence program in the 1990’s.

Thinking inside the box, I found this a bit hard to take initially, because I like thinking outside the box. I think that’s one of the advantages/benefits of KM, on a macro level it advocates diversity of thought, and learning from other industries or sectors, so the idea of “thinking inside the box” seemed counter-intuitive to me. But what this was really getting at was the idea that constraints build creativity and that often “the answer is right in front of you.” “Right in front of you” in this case could mean that there is someone in your organization that could provide knowledge or expertise or perhaps the knowledge you seek is in that repository or lessons learned system.

One of the themes that came up throughout the #PKMChat was the idea to take time to reflect and be curious, to challenge assumptions, to think critically about a challenge that is being faced. This was true in the discussion around thinking inside the box, too. Taking the time to look around your box and see what you have that might provide insight or an answer.

Practice, is critical to learning, for it is in practicing that we find the best solution and refine our techniques, whether we are artists, programmers, building cars, oil wells, or solar panels. Van Gogh practiced drawing heads, hands, and working with colour in order to get his style refined to what is easily recognizable today. Here we consider the 70-20-10 rule for managerial learning. Morgan McCall, Robert Eichinger and Michael Lombardo in their 1996 book, “The Career Architect” assert that 70% of the learning a successful manager does comes from doing, 20% comes from others, and 10% comes from formal education (books and classes). Practice makes perfect, as they say, but the chat participants also recognized that there is a point where perfection stops forward momentum and “good enough” is good enough.

Reflection, as I mentioned a moment ago reflection came up throughout the chat, even when it wasn’t the main topic of discussion. The consensus when it was the topic was that it was key to learning; that it allowed informed improvements to be made in future iterations of an activity rather than doing the same thing repeatedly. There was recognition that it needed to be part of the flow of the project of process and that the activity wasn’t complete until the reflection had taken place.

Van Gogh and artists reflect on their paintings and processes, on what they like or don’t like, what can be improved to more adequately reflect what they are trying to convey in their works.

Finally, we discussed social versus solo learning. There is a benefit to discussing work with others, whether, as in Van Gogh’s case he was writing to his brother, and talking with other artists or we are struggling with a new project we’ve been assigned to and look for others who have worked on similar initiatives before or talk to our friends/family about how they might approach the situation. The consensus here was that it was important to balance solo and social, and that balance was up to the individual to determine. Discussing things with others helps facilitate the challenging of assumptions because the other person/people aren’t as close to the problem as the person working directly on it so they might see things that we are too close to see.

One of the things that got mentioned a couple of times during the chat was the book, “Steal Like an Artist.” The book talks about 10 items but the first one is most relevant at this point, “steal like an artist.” Everything an artist does is based on what’s come before, something someone else has done. While it’s true that an individual artist may combine processes, techniques, and materials in a way that hasn’t been done before, or have their own style, they are building on something they have learned by doing or by being taught.

The question for me after all of this is: where does this fit with the work that I have been doing?

It’s clear that there is a linkage; artists use some of the same processes and activities that organizations do to learn and make better use of knowledge and experience (e.g. reflection, lessons learned, communities). They do it on an individual basis, rather than a group/organizational basis, but that’s just a matter of scale and rigour around the activities.

What else? Does creativity and the processes it utilizes lead to innovation? Certainly the participants in the chat seemed to think so, there was agreement that being creative lead to asking more questions, and challenging the status quo and that this impact was felt regardless of the field people worked in, i.e., non-artists and artists alike believed that either being exposed to art or participating in an artistic practice made them more curious and open to experimentation.

Creativity leads to innovation, both are facilitated by knowledge management practices, and both contribute artefacts that build the knowledge base of an individual or an organization.

 

References:

  1. Xerox case study about their artist in residence program, https://www.amazon.com/Art-Innovation-Artist-Residence-Leonardo/dp/0262082756
  2. Learning Solutions Magazine article on Van Gogh as a painter and learning coach https://www.learningsolutionsmag.com/articles/1560/emea-reporter-vincent-van-goghpainterand-learning-coach
  3. Jay Cross blog post on implementing 70-20-10 for learning, https://www.internettime.com/2013/02/50-suggestions-for-implementing-70-20-10/
  4. Steal Like an Artist book, https://austinkleon.com/steal/
  5. Steal like an Artist list https://www.austinkleon.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/poster-0.gif
  6. Steal Like an Artist workshop on Slideshare, https://www.slideshare.net/pederrudbeck/steal-like-an-artist-workshop-uxstoriesdk
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KM Standards vs. Principles

Wow, it’s been a long time since I posted a blog; I’ve been busy working with new clients and I just haven’t had any earth-shattering KM thoughts to share; no ba in my schedule lately.

[Aside: I wrote this for a side-project that I’m working on, so it may eventually appear somewhere in another format.]

There seems to be a lot of talk about KM standards lately, so here are some initial thoughts I had…

What does “standards” mean? According to Wikipedia, standards are “any norm, convention or requirement.”

What does “principles” mean? Again, according to Wikipedia, principles are “a law or rule that has to be, or usually is to be followed, or can be desirably followed, or is an inevitable consequence of something.”

How are they different? Principles are abstract, whereas standards provide something to be compared to/measured against; standards are more tangible.

How are they the same? They can both be used to provide direction, guidance, and/or insight into a situation.

As with everything we have to come to a common understanding, a common lexicon. We have to figure out what terms and ideas mean in our own context and in the context of the organization or group that we are working with.

Does KM need a common lexicon? Yes

Do we need a common understanding of what KM is? Yes

Do we need a common understanding of what isn’t KM? Yes

Should we be inclusive or exclusive? I believe inclusive, knowledge is a system, and it has many interconnected parts, excluding a part means we don’t have an accurate picture of what is happening. If one of the goals of knowledge management is to improve an organization’s efficiency and effectiveness with its knowledge, isn’t  it better to have an understanding of the whole system rather than one pillar of that system. Decision making will be that much better for understanding the system; innovation will be that much more successful for understanding the system. While having a more holistic view may be more challenging it will result in more comprehensive solution; a solution that is more workable and accepted.

Do we need hard and fast Knowledge Management rules to live by? No. Knowledge is a system, an organization is a system. In order to be successful we must be able to adapt to the needs and requirements of each system. There is no one “right” way to “do” KM. KM has to be adjusted to the culture and nature of the organization. There are similarities among KM implementations, but no two implementations are identical, because the needs of each organization are not identical.

KM has to be by design to be successful.

Design thinking is characterized by being purposive; human centered; a balance of analytical and creative; uses abductive reasoning, i.e. inference from best available explanation; and iterative, it uses prototyping and play testing to achieve success.

Here’s how these principles are applied in knowledge management:

Purposive: we look at the organization’s strategy, goals, and objectives and assess how knowledge management best supports those activities. The knowledge management strategy outlines how the organization’s goals and objectives are furthered through the application of knowledge management activities.

Human centered: the best knowledge management implementations consider the people of the organization, e.g. how they work, what makes their work-lives easier, what the culture of the organization is like and works with those requirements to make the organization more efficient and effective in its knowledge processes and activities.

A balance of analytical and creative: KM should be a balance of analytical and creative. It should capture knowledge and make it reusable, but it also needs to leave space, ba, to allow for knowledge creation. This space can look like lots of different things, e.g. giving employees 10% of their time for projects they want to work on/explore, foosball tables, basketball courts, gyms, art/creativity space, and communities of interest; activities that encourage different connections to be made.

Abductive reasoning: this sums up the belief in KM in general. It can be very difficult to prove a causal link between improved knowledge activities and improved organizational performance, metrics and ROI continue to be a significant hurdle for many organizations. However, anyone who has experience with implementing knowledge management successfully knows that efficiency and effectiveness in an organization are improved through the use of knowledge management activities.

Iterative: successful KM starts small and grows. It starts with an over-all strategy and plan, but then moves to pilots, which bring in small parts of the organization, so that lessons can be learned and adjustments made as the people, process, and supporting technology are implemented across the organization.

In conclusion, KM needs principles, a common lexicon, and a common understanding of what is and isn’t KM, but it does not need standards.

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Collaboration versus Command and Control

This post is about differing management styles and approaches to not just knowledge management but to business and ultimately life.

Do we believe there is a limited “pie” and so we need to compete and create hierarchies to control it (whatever “it” is in our own particular case) or do we believe in working together to make the pie bigger and be content with our own slice of pie, however big or small that may be?

As a small business person, I am not particularly interested in growing my business to be bigger than it is. I like doing consulting and giving focused, specialized service to my clients, I don’t need, nor do I want to grow my business to 25, 50, 100 or more people, I wouldn’t be able to do what I like to do in those scenarios. If a client or potential client wants services that I don’t offer, say development work for a particular software platform, I am perfectly willing to refer them to someone I know who specializes in that work rather than do it myself, or hire someone to work for me to do it for the client.

In my KM practice I often talk with people about what it takes to be successful with KM; people are often looking for that “magic bullet,” but there is none. It takes hard work to be successful with KM in any organization, but the more open and collaborative the organization is, the more likely it is to be successful.

Being open and collaborative is hard for a lot of people, especially for those who believe in a limited “pie” and hierarchy. Being open and collaborative goes against everything they believe in–command and control. They believe the worst about people, that people have to be told what to do, that without that command and control structure people will not do their jobs. They believe there is a limited “pie” and they are going to compete and they are going to win by whatever means possible, because that is the way the world works. Except that it’s not.

If you assume the worst about people, you get the worst; if you assume the best, you get the best, that is the way the world works. At least that is the way my world works, and the way the world that I want to live in works.

Being open and collaborative helps us all work together to produce a desired outcome, because we want to, because we believe in it, because we trust and respect ourselves and our colleagues. It makes a bigger “pie” possible, it also helps us to be content with the slice of “pie” we have.

Bigger is not better, more is not better.

So when I see KM people behaving in a command and control fashion, it confuses me. How can they be good at implementing and managing KM in an organization with behaviour like that? It smothers KM and sharing to be controlled. KM and sharing grows exponentially when it is given space (Nonaka’s ideas around Ba come to mind) and is allowed to happen; when it is supported and enabled, not controlled. Maintaining that openness is hard, it’s hard to have a lack of solid ground under us, we want the certainty of the rules and the ground, but to be successful in KM and in life we have to be okay with that uncertainty.

It takes a lot of self-knowledge and self-esteem to be okay with uncertainty and to manage in that way, but it’s the way to get the most out of your KM program and life.